BAGHDAD - A U.S. helicopter fired a Hellfire missile during fighting in a Shiite militia stronghold of Baghdad Friday, killing at least four people as deadly clashes broke out in Iraq's oil-rich south for the fourth day.

American jets also dropped bombs overnight in Basra in the first use of U.S. air power in the southern oil port since the Iraqi government launched a crackdown against Shiite militias there earlier this week.

Defying a curfew in Baghdad, extremists also lobbed more rockets or mortars against the U.S.-protected Green Zone.

At least two rounds struck the nearby offices of Sunni Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, killing two guards and wounding four, his daughter Lubna said.

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It seems like the shit has gone back to hitting the air impeller device.

Sadr is an outright thug. He murdered all of the senior clerics who would have stood in his way of claiming legitimacy to his inherited position and now he's making trips to Iran to hang out in Oom to soak up some holiness so he can lay claim to be a real cleric. We've put up with him far too long and it's about time this fight started. Luckily, his fighters are sheep herders compared to the Sunni ex-military we've got fighting along with us. We're going in carefully but we need to make it decisive.

Iraqs Prime Minister was staring into the abyss today after his operation to crush militia strongholds in Basra stalled, members of his own security forces defected and district after district of his own capital fell to Shia militia gunmen.

With the threat of a civil war looming in the south, Nouri al-Malikis police chief in Basra narrowly escaped assassination in the crucial port city, while in Baghdad, the spokesman for the Iraqi side of the US military surge was kidnapped by gunmen and his house burnt to the ground.

Saboteurs also blew up one of Iraq's two main oil pipelines from Basra, cutting at least a third of the exports from the city which provides 80 per cent of government revenue, a clear sign that the militias  who siphon significant sums off the oil smuggling trade  would not stop at mere insurrection.

In Baghdad, thick black smoke hung over the city centre tonight and gunfire echoed across the city.

The most secure area of the capital, Karrada, was placed under curfew amid fears the Mahdi Army of Hojetoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr could launch an assault on the residence of Abdelaziz al-Hakim, the head of a powerful rival Shia governing party.

While the Mahdi Army has not officially renounced its six-month ceasefire, which has been a key component in the recent security gains, on the ground its fighters were chasing police and soldiers from their positions across Baghdad.

Rockets from Sadr City slammed into the governmental Green Zone compound in the city centre, killing one person and wounding several more.

Mr al-Maliki has gambled everything on the success of Operation Saulat al-Fursan, or Charge of the Knights, to sweep illegal militias out of Basra.

It has targeted neighbourhoods where the Mahdi Army dominates, prompting intense fighting with mortars, rocket-grenades and machineguns in the narrow, fetid alleyways of Basra.

In Baghdad, the Mahdi Army took over neighbourhood after neighbourhood, some amid heavy fighting, others without firing a shot.

In New Baghdad, militiamen simply ordered the police to leave their checkpoints: the officers complied en masse and the guerrillas stepped out of the shadows to take over their checkpoints.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - President George W. Bush on Thursday announced a suspension of U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq this summer to allow the military to reassess the security situation.

The announcement came amid a spike in violence in Iraq in recent weeks. Iraqi police said on Thursday that U.S. air strikes killed 10 people in the eastern Baghdad militia stronghold of Sadr City, where street fighting had eased after four days of clashes that have killed close to 90 people.

Bush endorsed a recommendation by his commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, to complete a limited withdrawal of combat troops by July but then impose a 45-day freeze of the total at about 140,000 troops before considering more possible cuts.

"I've told him he'll have all the time he needs," Bush said in Washington.And since time equals more dead Americans, all the dead Americans Bush needs. The little bastard will leave the next president a pile of shit that he created. I guess his parent never taught him to clean up after himself.

And when we leave and it is still a failure, they will blame not themselves for shitty planning and execution, they will blame those who came to oppose the war.

If Sadr is able to make real his threat, how will they spin the success of the Surge then?

Either destroy his forces or get the hell out and let them sort it out. How much are we paying them now? It would be cheaper to just pay all the Iraqis to be nice to each other and then get our troops out.

BAGHDAD  Renegade cleric Muqtada al Sadr on Saturday issued a "final warning" to the Iraqi government, threatening an open-ended "war until liberation" if U.S. and Iraqi troops don't stop their offensive against followers of his militant Shiite Muslim movement.

Sadr's threat signals his growing fury with the joint U.S.-Iraqi offensive against his strongholds in Baghdad's Sadr City and in the volatile southern port city of Basra. Such a rebellion would end Sadr's eight-month-old ceasefire, which was widely credited - even by U.S. military officials - with curbing violence in Baghdad and throughout the Shiite south.
The U.S.-backed Iraqi military continued its two-front attack Saturday against the Mahdi Army and other outlaws, retaking government buildings from militiamen in Basra while waging fierce gun battles in the densely packed slums of Sadr City.

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